


Far From Home

by hopelesslydevoted



Category: Glee RPF
Genre: Angst, M/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-30
Updated: 2015-09-30
Packaged: 2018-04-24 02:03:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,871
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4901311
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hopelesslydevoted/pseuds/hopelesslydevoted
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Miles and miles from home, Darren is discovering just what it means to have a home and to lose one.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Far From Home

**Author's Note:**

> This story was written sitting alone on a hotel room bed this morning, after spending days alone in Shanghai and still having days alone to spend in Hong Kong. Perhaps, it is needless to say that this story is me dealing with some of the things I’ve experienced in this past week.

With the click of the door behind him closing, Darren is alone. He hates it.

A mesmerizing view of the city lights opens before him. It’s skyscrapers next to skyscrapers all in competition, each one trying to be more luxurious than the other. Poverty that he knows is there - it’s always there - is swept under the rug. Out of sight, out of mind. It’s just beauty and riches as far as eye can see, but it’s not the truth. It’s as dishonest as the smile fading on Darren’s lips.

There was a time when he didn’t hate all of it quite this much. But then, he wasn’t quite this alone at that time.

Looking at the busy streets below, a city heading towards another restless night, the irony isn’t lost on Darren. In a city inhabited by millions and millions, he feels lonely.

He hasn’t talked with _him_ in weeks.

It isn’t that there is nothing to say. There are plenty of things that Darren could say. There are plenty of things he would want to say. But he needs to remain silent. As tears well in his eyes, he knows the words on the tip of his tongue. If he called him, Darren knows he couldn’t stop them from spilling out, any more than he could stop them the last time they spoke.

_“Please, Chris, please. I love you.”_

And with the memory of his strangled plea, the first tears trickle down his stubble-covered cheek.

He can’t do this. He can’t break down because it would mean accepting that things are truly over this time. Still, he can’t help it. It does feel like it is truly over.

Darren sets the rest of his things on the bed of his hotel room and walks over to the open bathroom. As he turns on the faucet to fill in the bathtub, he thinks that this just might be the best place to nurture a broken heart. No, actually, there is one place better, his mama’s arms.

This time he can’t run to his mama. She would just convince him that they would sort everything out - again. And she would fill him with hope that he isn’t sure he should have. As much as he misses her arms, he can’t go to her until he is on the other side of this hurt.

Darren is standing in front of the bathroom mirror, but he isn’t looking at himself. His eyes are fixed on the ring on his right hand middle finger. It’s still there, because he doesn’t know how to not have it. Just like he doesn’t know how to not have the person who gave it to him.

He hesitates before taking off the ring and placing it on the counter. Darren hopes that someday it will not hurt so much to take it off. He hopes it will not hurt so much to be without it.

When the bathtub is full, Darren turns off the faucet. He slips out of his clothes and into the warm water. He closes his eyes. A couple of more tears run down his cheeks. Tears seem so gravely at odds with who he is. But it has always been this way with Chris, incredible highs and vicious lows.

It’s moments like these when Darren misses Chris the most. At home, his life is a blur of working hard, meeting people and pursuing passions. And it's work that brought him here. It will keep him busy for the next days. But it doesn’t stop him from missing Chris now. He shouldn’t be missing Chris, not this much anymore, because it’s been weeks.

Darren hates this new normal. During the year together – even if together meant, for them, being in the shadows or behind closed doors – they had adventures, together and individually. Although it always pained him to walk out of the door, to leave Chris behind when he had to, when they had to, there was a calming knowledge that Chris would be there when he went back. It was the gravity that always pulled him back to where he belonged.

The life they had in Los Angeles is light years away from the life of anyone here. Darren leans back in the bathtub, taking in the view. Here, home is a congested, small apartment in one of the many high-rises where all too similar apartments are stacked up one on another.

It would be so easy to disappear here. He could be just Darren, a son of an American banker and a Filipino house-wife. Nothing more. He could be just a tiny ant in a big nest, completely insignificant.

It’s all too tempting to not return to his life. There isn’t a home anymore, not really, because the apartment he owns never felt like a home. There is only work waiting for him, work that he has grown to dislike. He can imagine his life here, as much as he wants to, as much as he needs to in order to sooth his soul. But he knows he can’t disappear, even if he wanted to.

Darren sinks his head under the water to wet his hair. When he starts working the shampoo in his curls, there’s a sudden searing ache in his chest. He remembers it, so vividly that he doesn’t need to close his eyes to feel Chris’ nimble fingers entangled in his hair. After long days of filming, Chris took pride in his task. (It wasn’t really a task, but they had done it enough times to form an unbreakable routine.) Under the running water, Chris washed away what they called physical manifestation of the oppression. He washed Darren’s hair free from the gelled constrains the show put it in. And more often than not, after the task was finished, Chris kissed him dizzy, pressing him against the cold tiles of the bathroom wall.

And the memory of Chris’ lips on his own, his hands clutching his sides break Darren. He starts sobbing, so helplessly, so violently that he is shaking. It’s like his emotions are rattled to the surface because he can’t contain it anymore. Hidden from the world, from everyone, he can finally cry. But there is no one to hold him, no one to tell him he will survive this.

He is alone because Chris left him.

Darren doesn’t blame Chris. He knows just how much he asked from him on that chilly winter night when he confessed his feelings to him. Like Chuck often teases him, Darren is a lot to handle. His boundless energy could easily drive a person mad with too much exposure. Darren can also be incredibly clingy at times, especially towards the people he loves the most. And in relationships, there was his jealousy to deal with. But all of these things are minor compared to the struggles forced upon them by a couple of carefully chosen words in a paper with his signature.

Darren couldn’t blame Chris because he endured it all for such a long time. He should just be thankful for everything Chris gave him. Perhaps, Darren would be thankful someday. Now, the pain buries everything else underneath, and the pain isn’t going anywhere. It feels all-consuming and ever-growing, which makes it all that much more unbearable.

But Darren can’t dwell on it. The more he thinks of Chris, the more he is in pain, so he needs to keep his mind preoccupied. The need to keep himself busy led him here, to this city on this night and for the next couple of nights. It is a desperate attempt, but it’s worth a try. He just can’t continue, walking aimlessly in the streets of Los Angeles or New York, being reminded of everything he lost.

After the tears stop streaming down, Darren gets off the bathtub and puts his robe on. He stands there for just a moment, his hand hovering over the ring on the counter. Could he do it? Could he learn to let go? He doesn’t want to find out, not now. He isn't ready. He takes the ring, cradling it inside his palm, before walking out of the bathroom.

Darren sits on the edge of the bed. His shoulders tense, like the burden on them got suddenly heavier, when he opens his palm and studies the ring on his hand. It’s just a ring. It should be just a ring, but it is so much more. And Darren slips it back on his finger.

It’s silly, or pathetic really, how close Darren feels to Chris when he wears the ring. The ring came with a promise, like all of the other rings Chris had given him. Perhaps, the promises were broken now, but they were once given to him. Looking at the ring on his finger, Darren doesn’t think of the things he lost, he thinks of the things he had. The promises that Chris had given only to him - freely.

There were other promises made when everything came undone. They agreed not to make things too difficult for each other, knowing it would be difficult enough. It meant distance and silence, worth of weeks. Darren had agreed, reluctantly, because he knew it was for the best. He thought it was for the best.

Still, a part of him fears that weeks will turn into months and months into years. He is worried that they can never really come back from this, not be friends after everything they found and lost. But then again, he doesn’t really know if they ever really were friends, they had always been something much more.

Darren takes out his mobile phone from his jacket pocket and stares at it for a while. He doesn’t know what he is doing until he has found the name he was looking for. Darren knows he shouldn’t do it, but unwritten rules don’t stop him, like they didn’t stop him when he pursued Chris all those years ago.

The phone rings once, two, three, four, five times until the call is picked up. There is a silent crack on a line as if it isn’t strong enough to carry all the heaviness between them. Chris answered. He had at least answered the call.

“I miss you.” Darren says after a moment of silence.

There is a torturous wait for Chris’ response. Darren knows he is breaking the most the most important of the rules with his confession. He knows Chris is hurting too. And any tender words shared between them just hurt them that much more. Yet, it is the safest thing to say, out of all the things he would want to say, and it is the truth. He knows that truth can be painful at times. It was the truth, after all, when Chris said to him weeks ago that he can’t do this anymore, be with him.

“I-I miss you too.”

The words are hesitant, delivered in a voice barely above a whisper. Darren knows it is true because there are unshed tears in Chris’ voice. Truth, the reality of their dire situation, always broke them. But the love they share, that is also true. Perhaps, truth can also fix them.


End file.
